It's about short-term growth and profit. Quarter over quarter results.

Workers are the cogs but shareholders are the bosses. If the company doesn't hit their magic number for the quarter, then they just get rid of cogs to increase profit. Some accountant says, "We fell short on our predictions so we need to reduce costs. Fire people and we'll worry about it next quarter."

rumpelstiltskin:bdub77: They don't have to listen to you, because they have f*ck you money and you don't.

We're going to be in trouble when the American peasant realizes he doesn't need any money to say "fark you." If he wasn't such an unlikely combination of stupidity and docility, we might already be a nightmare like Canada.

Businesses have moved on, many of them don't even need the average American to consume anymore. They have the whole globe, they are selling durable goods in BRIC and other developing countries now. Even on the food front the government automatically subsidizes the majority of it anyway through corn subsidies and food stamps.

Kill education, increase religion. You've got a dumb docile public now, put the firehose in its mouth. Hyperinflate the dollar, kill wages, increase unemployment, exploit the workforce, and turn the US into a third world country. What are you gonna do about it, peasant?

skinink:Can't understand why I keep seeing reports that the economy is gradually improving, while at the same time I see so many stories about companies laying off. My company just laid off someone who had been with the company for over 17 years. Great person and an excellent worker. Just let him go to reduce headcount.

It's because those are the stories people want to read. The fourth estate is a for-profit institution.

bdub77:Mugato: it's incumbent upon us to stay ahead of the curve. To that end, we've undergone a review of our organizational structures and processes, and have re-imagined and realigned certain areas and functions to gain efficiencies and better position us for future growth

How about you increase your core competencies and make go farking yourself a primary action item with an eye toward productivity and connectivity. That would be great.

They don't have to listen to you, because they have f*ck you money and you don't.

The vast majority of big business isn't about revenue growth or reinvestment or R&D anymore, it's about profit margins. When your market share solidifies, which happens in just about every business, you cut costs to gain as much profit margin as possible. Why? It's about earnings per share and using those earnings (cash) to buy back shares of stock. And it's ONLY about stock price for those assholes at the top. And only short term stock price.

If you cut too many people and people begin hating you and everything starts to erode, you can just hand the company off early to some other CEO and then blame them when things start to go south (bonus points if the new CEO is a woman, like Ginny Rometty.) Or if the company goes under while you're still CEO, just take your golden parachute because you've got dirt on how many prostitutes the board of directors has buried in his backyard.

The sh*ttiest, most irresponsible thing about this stuff is that most of these 1% clowns with their 20 million dollar paychecks don't even know how to reinvest their own money into other ventures. They just float around on a f*cking cushion of cash.

But I'm sure it's good for the yacht industry. I'm sure whatever CEO has the foresight and money to start a yacht company will come out gangbusters.

Pretty concise appraisal.

Some of it IS technological. A computer handles jobs the 2nd Assistant Line Producer used to do, for example. So you don't need that slot.

So, how do you revinest the cash in a media enviorment? Good question. But the Pigs at the top don't care. They will just eat it.

See, here is the thing. You can screw over everybody else, because they lack the charisma, intelligence and/or drive to stage a revolt. They might have one of the traits, but usually not any of the others. If they had such things, they would be in upper middle class

Now, the upper middle class, they might not have the numbers, but they have the intelligence and drive to round up the lower classes and take down the top. They also might have more charisma as well, which would make them better leaders and, if it came to it, martyrs. If Joe Sixpack gets gunned down due to rebellious talk, it can be covered up pretty easy and be wrote off as a "lunatic" or "terrorist". But if say a college professor or a local small business man get gunned down, well, now we have something, because why would somebody, who lives a pretty comfortable life, want to risk their way of life and change things unless things were really, really bad.

Let's see: The Dow's at 14,900. A company with over $42,000,000,000 in revenues last year and a current market cap of $114,936,085,637 is claiming it needs to quit employing as many people in order to stay competitive.

Yeah, I think we're OK to call "bullshiat" when we see it.

That doesn't meant Disney TELEVISION is profitable. That means between the stable of television, film, cruise lines, amusement parks, clothing, toys, books, video games and online content, they are profitable. I'm not going to read the annual report for a division breakdown, but you can check if you like. If they don't mention TV at all in the report, or only mention restructuring it, it's losing money.

jakomo002:It's about short-term growth and profit. Quarter over quarter results.

Workers are the cogs but shareholders are the bosses. If the company doesn't hit their magic number for the quarter, then they just get rid of cogs to increase profit. Some accountant says, "We fell short on our predictions so we need to reduce costs. Fire people and we'll worry about it next quarter."

The funny thing here is I used to work for a company that had a specifically written mission that essentially ranked their priorities: 1. Customers 2. Employees 3. ShareholdersThen they thought it was a good idea to audit themselves on this , then they were shocked when they were hammered by their emplyees. It's always the shareholders first. There's likely not a fortune 500 company in the world that wouldn't lay off employees or raise customer prices before going in front of shareholders to tell them their profits were compromised on behalf of customers or employees. I'd be interested in hearing abnout it if I were wrong, though.

jakomo002:It's about short-term growth and profit. Quarter over quarter results.

Workers are the cogs but shareholders are the bosses. If the company doesn't hit their magic number for the quarter, then they just get rid of cogs to increase profit. Some accountant says, "We fell short on our predictions so we need to reduce costs. Fire people and we'll worry about it next quarter."

Seems to me Disney keeps getting bigger even though they've been doing this since the 80s. Are you just mad because it hurts middle class people? I'm okay with that, I'm just pointing out that this isn't "bad business" from a long-term business perspective if it's making them one of the world's most successful megacorps.

Let's see: The Dow's at 14,900. A company with over $42,000,000,000 in revenues last year and a current market cap of $114,936,085,637 is claiming it needs to quit employing as many people in order to stay competitive.

Yeah, I think we're OK to call "bullshiat" when we see it.

That doesn't meant Disney TELEVISION is (as) profitable. That means between the stable of television, film, cruise lines, amusement parks, clothing, toys, books, video games and online content, they are profitable. I'm not going to read the annual report for a division breakdown, but you can check if you like. If they don't mention TV at all in the report, or only mention restructuring it,it's losing money

not as profitable as the other divisions.

FTFYAny division not making money is axed. No corporation will sustain any loss of profit from other divisions. Any division losing money is disposed of as quickly as possible. Thats why the pharmaceutical companies insist on mass-manufacturing chemotherapy drugs and maintaining their research divisions along those lines instead of doing any research into actually curing cancer.

Workers are the cogs but shareholders are the bosses. If the company doesn't hit their magic number for the quarter, then they just get rid of cogs to increase profit. Some accountant says, "We fell short on our predictions so we need to reduce costs. Fire people and we'll worry about it next quarter."

The funny thing here is I used to work for a company that had a specifically written mission that essentially ranked their priorities: 1. Customers 2. Employees 3. ShareholdersThen they thought it was a good idea to audit themselves on this , then they were shocked when they were hammered by their emplyees. It's always the shareholders first. There's likely not a fortune 500 company in the world that wouldn't lay off employees or raise customer prices before going in front of shareholders to tell them their profits were compromised on behalf of customers or employees. I'd be interested in hearing abnout it if I were wrong, though.

Bang on. The REAL money is at the top. CEO, COO, executives.

They want to keep their jobs so badly that if they need to cut costs they will gleefully throw loyal hardworking employees to the lions so their End-of-quarter speech goes over better with investors .

/laid off twice by profitable companies/was laid off at one after three years but my work neighbor was too, after 14 years and while his wife was pregnant with twins/NEVER be too loyal to your employer, know you're a useless cog compared to The Suits

Deathfrogg:That doesn't meant Disney TELEVISION is (as) profitable. That means between the stable of television, film, cruise lines, amusement parks, clothing, toys, books, video games and online content, they are profitable. I'm not going to read the annual report for a division breakdown, but you can check if you like. If they don't mention TV at all in the report, or only mention restructuring it,it's losing money not as profitable as the other divisions.

FTFYAny division not making money is axed. No corporation will sustain any loss of profit from other divisions. Any division losing money is disposed of as quickly as possible. Thats why the pharmaceutical companies insist on mass-manufacturing chemotherapy drugs and maintaining their research divisions along those lines instead of doing any research into actually curing cancer.

I agree with your change of wording, but disagree with "any division losing money is disposed of as quickly as possible." Especially in this case. Disney's television platform allows for an amazing amount of cross-promotion that could keep television alive while not actually turning a profit. Even outside of the blatant film and game advertising on Disney channel, the ABC family's teen hour (Pretty Little Liars, Vampire Diaries, etc) is used to promote music on the disney record label, as are the TV movies. It is also used to promote DVD and blue-ray releases for home video sales. Not just with commercials, but playing the films being released.

In general, a company may not be able to get rit of a slightly un-profitable business unit, or may expect losses for a few years while restructuring or changing strategy. It does happen, but only for short periods of time.

Let's see: The Dow's at 14,900. A company with over $42,000,000,000 in revenues last year and a current market cap of $114,936,085,637 is claiming it needs to quit employing as many people in order to stay competitive.

Yeah, I think we're OK to call "bullshiat" when we see it.

That doesn't meant Disney TELEVISION is (as) profitable. That means between the stable of television, film, cruise lines, amusement parks, clothing, toys, books, video games and online content, they are profitable. I'm not going to read the annual report for a division breakdown, but you can check if you like. If they don't mention TV at all in the report, or only mention restructuring it,it's losing money not as profitable as the other divisions.

FTFYAny division not making money is axed. No corporation will sustain any loss of profit from other divisions. Any division losing money is disposed of as quickly as possible. Thats why the pharmaceutical companies insist on mass-manufacturing chemotherapy drugs and maintaining their research divisions along those lines instead of doing any research into actually curing cancer.

Subsidizing unprofitable divisions happens all the time. Don't be ignorant.

Workers are the cogs but shareholders are the bosses. If the company doesn't hit their magic number for the quarter, then they just get rid of cogs to increase profit. Some accountant says, "We fell short on our predictions so we need to reduce costs. Fire people and we'll worry about it next quarter."

The funny thing here is I used to work for a company that had a specifically written mission that essentially ranked their priorities: 1. Customers 2. Employees 3. ShareholdersThen they thought it was a good idea to audit themselves on this , then they were shocked when they were hammered by their emplyees. It's always the shareholders first. There's likely not a fortune 500 company in the world that wouldn't lay off employees or raise customer prices before going in front of shareholders to tell them their profits were compromised on behalf of customers or employees. I'd be interested in hearing abnout it if I were wrong, though.

Bang on. The REAL money is at the top. CEO, COO, executives.

They want to keep their jobs so badly that if they need to cut costs they will gleefully throw loyal hardworking employees to the lions so their End-of-quarter speech goes over better with investors .

/laid off twice by profitable companies/was laid off at one after three years but my work neighbor was too, after 14 years and while his wife was pregnant with twins/NEVER be too loyal to your employer, know you're a useless cog compared to The Suits

Spend $2b on a boondoggle rfid implementation (one of many examples): $200 million in bonuses for management.

TV division doesn't make enough money: Immediately fire people, preferably older more experienced employees causing a tailspin in the division which will cause it to be sold off. More bonuses for savvy management.

Wangiss:Seems to me Disney keeps getting bigger even though they've been doing this since the 80s. Are you just mad because it hurts middle class people? I'm okay with that, I'm just pointing out that this isn't "bad business" from a long-term business perspective if it's making them one of the world's most successful megacorps.

Unlimited growth is unsustainable. Disney's longterm sustainability looks forward maximum two quarters. If one segment does poorly they axe it immediately.

Their spreadsheets have a section called Labor Costs and that's how they see their employees. Not as an INVESTMENT but a cost that cuts into profit and might negatively impact stock price.

Let's see: The Dow's at 14,900. A company with over $42,000,000,000 in revenues last year and a current market cap of $114,936,085,637 is claiming it needs to quit employing as many people in order to stay competitive.

Yeah, I think we're OK to call "bullshiat" when we see it.

That doesn't meant Disney TELEVISION is (as) profitable. That means between the stable of television, film, cruise lines, amusement parks, clothing, toys, books, video games and online content, they are profitable. I'm not going to read the annual report for a division breakdown, but you can check if you like. If they don't mention TV at all in the report, or only mention restructuring it,it's losing money not as profitable as the other divisions.

FTFYAny division not making money is axed. No corporation will sustain any loss of profit from other divisions. Any division losing money is disposed of as quickly as possible. Thats why the pharmaceutical companies insist on mass-manufacturing chemotherapy drugs and maintaining their research divisions along those lines instead of doing any research into actually curing cancer.

Subsidizing unprofitable divisions happens all the time. Don't be ignorant.

Excuse me, I should have written what mike_d85 wrote. I apologize for being rude.

Pixar is in the process of restructuring too. From what I hear, it's typical misguided attempts at outsourcing to "reduce costs" but in reality are going to make things more complicated, add delays, and not meet quality standards and thus even more expensive.

mike_d85:I agree with your change of wording, but disagree with "any division losing money is disposed of as quickly as possible." Especially in this case. Disney's television platform allows for an amazing amount of cross-promotion that could keep television alive while not actually turning a profit. Even outside of the blatant film and game advertising on Disney channel, the ABC family's teen hour (Pretty Little Liars, Vampire Diaries, etc) is used to promote music on the disney record label, as are the TV movies. It is also used to promote DVD and blue-ray releases for home video sales. Not just with commercials, but playing the films being released.

In general, a company may not be able to get rit of a slightly un-profitable business unit, or may expect losses for a few years while restructuring or changing strategy. It does happen, but only for short periods of time.

But Disney can only do this because it's a behemoth. A giant media presence owning a substantial part of ALL US media, so they can crossmarket.

jakomo002:Wangiss: Seems to me Disney keeps getting bigger even though they've been doing this since the 80s. Are you just mad because it hurts middle class people? I'm okay with that, I'm just pointing out that this isn't "bad business" from a long-term business perspective if it's making them one of the world's most successful megacorps.

Unlimited growth is unsustainable. Disney's longterm sustainability looks forward maximum two quarters. If one segment does poorly they axe it immediately.

Their spreadsheets have a section called Labor Costs and that's how they see their employees. Not as an INVESTMENT but a cost that cuts into profit and might negatively impact stock price.

They've sustained growth using this model for decades. Are you just dogmatically attached to this idea? How long does Disney have to continue growth doing exactly what you say is unsustainable for you to change your mind? 100 years? Or in year 101, if they finally stop growing, will that be the treasured proof of your philosophy?

They've sustained growth using this model for decades. Are you just dogmatically attached to this idea? How long does Disney have to continue growth doing exactly what you say is unsustainable for you to change your mind? 100 years? Or in year 101, if they finally stop growing, will that be the treasured proof of your philosophy?

I'm sorry... this marks you as an idiot or a corporate sycophant. There is no dogma to that belief. It's mathematical. Eventually you outgrow the world.

Breaking News: Corporations like Disney are run by heartless, greedy bastards who look at nothing more than money figures to influence their business decisions. This will eventually lead to an economy where we will have to literally lick the boots of our corporate masters in order to be able to get a meal to eat.

This Just In: I have just been fired from ABC for reporting this story. Of all the obvious, sometimes mindless stories I report on, THIS IS THE ONE THAT GETS ME FIRED YOU FARKS!

Wangiss:They've sustained growth using this model for decades. Are you just dogmatically attached to this idea? How long does Disney have to continue growth doing exactly what you say is unsustainable for you to change your mind? 100 years? Or in year 101, if they finally stop growing, will that be the treasured proof of your philosophy?

We live in a actual world with natural laws. Unlimited growth is unsustainable. The economic models can disagree, but it'll be their downfall. I mean, MORE MORE MORE is hardly a realistic longterm model for survival of anything anywhere EVER.

Let's see: The Dow's at 14,900. A company with over $42,000,000,000 in revenues last year and a current market cap of $114,936,085,637 is claiming it needs to quit employing as many people in order to stay competitive.

Yeah, I think we're OK to call "bullshiat" when we see it.

That doesn't meant Disney TELEVISION is profitable. That means between the stable of television, film, cruise lines, amusement parks, clothing, toys, books, video games and online content, they are profitable. I'm not going to read the annual report for a division breakdown, but you can check if you like. If they don't mention TV at all in the report, or only mention restructuring it, it's losing money.

FULL DISCLOSURE: I'm a Disney stockholder. I don't think that creates a conflict of interest, but I figured I'd throw it out there.

From the Annual Report: "For the second year in a row Disney achieved record net income, revenue, and earnings per share. In fiscal 2012, net income for our shareholders was a record $5.7 billion, an increase of 18% over last year, and revenue was a record $42.3 billion, up 3% from last year. Diluted earnings per share increased 24% to a record $3.13."

So, the company as a whole is doing OK. Let's break down the numbers a little more. All dollars in millions.Revenue: Media Networks $ 19,436Expense: Media Networks $ 6,619Net: $ 12,817

That's $12,817,000,000. I could go even deeper and pull more numbers, but I think you get the picture. Broadcasting is the most profitable thing Disney does, in terms of net income. The parks brought in about 12 billion vs. a billion and change in expenses, for comparison.

TV's not losing money for Disney. TV's making them astronomical sums of money. But they felt the need to lay off people, to "better position themselves for future growth".

175 people is not a lot of people to Disney. This is likely either (A) eliminating the poorest performers or (B) getting rid of some small part of the business. Maybe they're getting rid of go.com or something.

But seriously... you all think that there's some moral responsibility that employers have to keep people employed when they're not needed?

jakomo002:Wangiss: They've sustained growth using this model for decades. Are you just dogmatically attached to this idea? How long does Disney have to continue growth doing exactly what you say is unsustainable for you to change your mind? 100 years? Or in year 101, if they finally stop growing, will that be the treasured proof of your philosophy?

We live in a actual world with natural laws. Unlimited growth is unsustainable. The economic models can disagree, but it'll be their downfall. I mean, MORE MORE MORE is hardly a realistic longterm model for survival of anything anywhere EVER.

In general, I agree with you. But your argument doesn't work when you consider that the 'closed system' you are considering isn't static. Disney can keep growing if we colonize Mars and have another 2 billion people there. And Disney can sell their movies and license their theme parks over interstellar radio when we discover a technological species inhabiting a star 8 light years from here. If you're talking about the ultimate heat death of the universe, then you're absolutely right. But that's a loooooong way away.

(Your argument can get confused very easily with the "evolution violates the laws of thermodynamics" whackos, too. Be cautious with your wording.)

skinink:Can't understand why I keep seeing reports that the economy is gradually improving, while at the same time I see so many stories about companies laying off. My company just laid off someone who had been with the company for over 17 years. Great person and an excellent worker. Just let him go to reduce headcount.

Even in vibrant economies some of the hundreds of thousands of businesses that exist in this country will be decreasing headcount at any given time.

Romero.jpg

What you would hope for is that more businesses are hiring than firing. Which is basically what has been happening since late 2009, although slowly.

lohphat:bdub77: And so the rounds of layoffs at big corporations begin again.

Pixar is in the process of restructuring too. From what I hear, it's typical misguided attempts at outsourcing to "reduce costs" but in reality are going to make things more complicated, add delays, and not meet quality standards and thus even more expensive.

The must have hired some Boeing execs.

Hey, Boeng doesn't outsource. They move to a right-to-work state where the inexperienced, undeducated and unspecialized workforce doesn't know how to handle volitile parts correctly.

Gonz:TV's not losing money for Disney. TV's making them astronomical sums of money. But they felt the need to lay off people, to "better position themselves for future growth".

I how people on Fark and other places (not the the person I am quoting, BTW) will talk about "serving the stockholders" and "maximizing profit" was sent down on stone tablets by God. It wasn't... the where we are in the U.S. in terms of corporate law and it's something that can be changed by legislative process. The corporation needs a legal state to run (they don't like it, but it's true) and they can be regulated by laws. They can even be *gasp* liquidated and their charters taken away.

Of course none of this will happen any time soon as our congresscritters are basically corporate controlled... but that is the way it is supposed to work.

geopb:175 people is not a lot of people to Disney. This is likely either (A) eliminating the poorest performers or (B) getting rid of some small part of the business. Maybe they're getting rid of go.com or something.

But seriously... you all think that there's some moral responsibility that employers have to keep people employed when they're not needed?

That's exactly what many of them misguidedly think. They can't get it in their heads that it isnt in the best interests of companies to axe people whose efforts are worth what they are being paid.